


Unmasked Heroes

by In_agony_and_ecstasy



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - High School, Bullies, Bullying, Chubby!Jean, Coming Out, Coming of Age, Drawing, Gay Straight Alliance, Insecurities, M/M, Superheroes, bisexual!Connie, bisexual!jean, comic books
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-05
Updated: 2015-09-05
Packaged: 2018-04-19 05:24:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 10,859
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4734227
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/In_agony_and_ecstasy/pseuds/In_agony_and_ecstasy
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Connie and Jean become friends by default. Both of them are outsiders in their school, bullied by popular kids. In Connie's case, because he stands out so much, and in Jean's case because he's chubby and intimidating. </p><p>Jean has never been close to anyone the way he is with Connie, and the new found feelings they have for each other scares him. He's scared of losing their friendship, and he's scared of pursing their relationship when they're already such outcasts. </p><p>It's not until Connie's safety is in jeopardy, and Jean's forced to be brave once, that he thinks he might be able to be brave for Connie all the time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Unmasked Heroes

**Author's Note:**

> Just a warning, there are a couple homophobic slurs in this fic!

My bedroom door is open a crack, letting light from the hallway filter into my room, but my mom can’t see us. She’s in bed. Her TV’s volume is up just high enough that mumbling, an audience clapping, high-pitched laughter and the opening theme song of some show prick at my ears. The only other sound is Connie’s shaky breath. His eyes search mine. My own panic is reflected in them. Even in the low light glowing from my laptop screen on my desk, the crease in Connie’s forehead is apparent. He’s as freaked out as I am. 

His hand reaches for mine. I hesitate before I take it. I remind myself no one can see.

“Are we doing this?” Connie whispers. We’ve been debating for what felt like most of the night, the week, the year. He came over to work on a project together. As the sun set outside, our textbooks got shoved closer and closer to the edge of the bed until they fell off. We scooted inch by inch closer to each other, talking, then whispering, then trying to read the other’s mind. We have felt this for a while. We’ve almost talked about it so many times. The blushing, the lingering touches, the phone calls that last into the night because we don’t want to hang up, the nervous laughter, and the warm fluttering gut-feeling that this meant more. Now we’re here, inches apart from sealing our fate. 

I swallow with some difficulty. “If you want.” I want to.

He licks his lips, bites down on the bottom one, and I wonder what it would be like to do that for him. 

He leans in. His eyes are still looking into mine. Just before it’s too late, he shuts them, and his lips press against my own. I almost don’t kiss back. I’m almost too shocked, too terrified, too unsure of this moment’s reality to kiss back. But when I do, his lips mold to mine, and I slide my hand around the nape of his neck to pull him in, making the kiss deeper. This feels safe. This feels right. This feels like what my lips have been waiting for. 

He parts from me. “Well?”

I exhale. My heart is the loudest noise in the room. My fingers lace with Connie’s. “I – I thought it was…uh. I liked it.”

“You did?” 

“You didn’t?” I blurt, hearing how desperate I sound. If I liked it and he didn’t, I wouldn’t be able to talk to him again. After something like this, we could never be the same. 

“No no no,” he reassures me, inching closer to me on my bed, “I liked it.”

“Yeah?”

He nods. We’re quiet for a moment. His hand is shaking in mine. I’m not sure what to do. I want to kiss him again. I want to kiss him enough that I forget to think.

“What now?” he asks. 

“I don’t know.”

“What does this mean?” 

“I don’t know.” I wince, because I almost say something else. I almost tell him this means nothing. But it isn’t nothing. It’s more than anything that’s ever happened to me. I’ve kissed girls, and I’ve liked it. But I’ve never liked kissing anyone as much as him. 

“I’m scared, Jean.” His voice cracks. I place my hand on his cheek and stroke his cheekbone with my thumb. 

“Well, don’t be,” I say, even though I am too. 

His shoulders slouch somewhat. He lets out an exhale. When his eyes meet mine again, they aren’t as wide. 

“Can I kiss you again?” I ask, trying not to sound too hopeful. He could say no. 

He doesn’t respond at first. 

“Please? I really want to.” So much for not sounding too eager. 

“Okay.” 

Then he leans in once more and I let myself really kiss him. I want him to know that I’m worth it. Whatever this is, whatever we are, it’s worth kissing me. 

I hold him close, placing my hands on his waist. His fingers thread through my blonde undercut, making it fray out in every direction. His lips are soft, malleable against mine and we ease into each other, breathing from one another. 

We don’t separate as I roll him onto his back. His hands spread over me, and I realize no one has ever touched me like him. He doesn’t react like he’s concerned my body will crush him as I lay between his legs. The girls I’ve been with have never mentioned my weight, but they’ve all flinched while touching me. They’ve always wrapped their arms around me but have never held me, and their hands have always traveled over my body but they’ve never explored me. 

Connie pulls me closer. His hands caress every part of me he can reach as I kiss him. 

It only makes me want to kiss him more. I pry his mouth open with mine, and rut against him. He moans, says my name, before his lips return to mine. I’m just about to slide his shirt off, kiss more of him, taste his dark, warm skin. Drown myself in his musky cologne. Leave a mark or two on his collarbones. Feel his pulse race against my lips. But just as I’m about to, something thuds and I know my mom has gotten out of bed. She’s likely going to check on us, see if we need anything, that sort of mom thing moms do. 

I tear myself from Connie. 

He doesn’t have to ask me why. He’s already looking at the door as he slides, completely dressed, underneath my covers. I’m doing the same beside him.

My mom does get up. She goes into the kitchen for a glass of water, and on her way back to her bedroom she peeks into my room. Connie and I are both on our backs, on separate sides of the bed, pretending to sleep. She shuts the door.

The room is cloaked in darkness. I can’t see Connie’s expression when I roll on to my side to spoon him, but I can feel his body relax against mine. We stay in that position. He falls asleep first. I count his breaths, savor the feeling of his ribcage rising and falling underneath my arm, before I drift off into sleep too.

…

When I walk into school the following Monday, something has shifted. It’s as if these are not the same walls I’ve walked through for three years. These walls are more like a prison, made of brick, and painted a darker gray than I remember. The halls are more crowded too. Every student, I swear, stares at me as I walk past. When girls giggle it’s louder, and when people slam lockers it shakes my insides. My breathing comes quick. I feel like everyone knows. Everyone at this very moment is staring at me, seeing my night with Connie broadcast in my thoughts. I grip on to my backpack’s straps like I’m about to jump out of a plane and it’s my parachute. 

At the end of the hall, I can either turn left and head to my own locker or turn right and head to Connie’s. Every morning since Connie and I have met I have turned right. For some reason, today I hesitate before taking my right. 

He’s waiting at his locker for me. He has a comic book in his hands that he’s trying to hide behind his geometry textbook. He’s wearing a snapback. Until one of the teachers catches him and demands he take it off, revealing his buzzed head, he’ll insist on wearing it. Of course, he isn’t wearing his glasses. In fact, no one knows he _has_ glasses except me. As special as I feel because I know he has them, and as cute as he looks in his glasses, I like being able to see his hazel eyes. His back is leaning against the lockers, and he’s trying to look cool and relaxed. I walk up to him, and have to look down at him because he’s so much shorter than me. I always liked that about him too.

Today the space between us feels vast and concrete, like I’d have to drill through it just to touch him. I wouldn’t touch him, not at school. Not after what’s happened. 

“Hey,” he says. His voice shakes. His fingers tap the hardcover of his textbook.

I run my fingers through my hair. Suddenly, I can’t make myself speak. The weight of everyone else’s stares is crushing me. I look over my shoulder and scan the flocks of students passing through. Teachers lounge outside of the entrances to their classrooms, squinting over the rims of their glasses at students wearing skirts too short or boys shoving other boys into lockers. No one is even looking at Connie and me. They don’t care a bit. So why do I feel like I’m getting caught on camera stealing? Connie and I are just talking, like we always do. It’s not like I kissed him _here_. 

“Hey,” I say, “Uh, what’s up?”

He arches an eyebrow at me, like he can’t understand why I would say that. 

“Did you get my texts?” he asks. 

I did. After he left my place Saturday morning, I read every text he sent me over the course of the rest of the weekend multiple times. I never replied. I didn’t know what to say. Because I’d either say nothing, or I’d say _everything_. I’d tell him how much I loved kissing him, how nice it was to sleep with him in my arms, how cute he was when he got mad at me for commenting on his bad breath, or how funny it was watching him nearly fall out of bed just to get up in the morning.

I’d tell him that I’ve never had a friend like him – a friend at all, _besides_ him. I’d tell him how terrified I am that our friendship is tainted. I’d tell him that I’m afraid of losing him. 

“Yeah, uh, sorry. I was busy,” I say.

He looks even more confused. “Doing what?” 

I look away from him. He damn well knows that the only thing I ever have going on in my life is him. I don’t have anyone else to hang out with, and I don’t go to church. I don’t have any extracurricular activities to worry about. If I’m not with him on weekends, I’m hanging out with my mom, doing chores, or doing homework. None of these things would keep me from texting him.

“I saw my dad,” I lie. It’s the first one I come up with. I hold in my sigh. Everyone thinks Connie is stupid, and sure, he struggles in school and sometimes it takes him a while to catch on to a joke or remember something obvious. But he knows more than he thinks he does. He stares at me, studying me, unraveling me. 

See, Connie has this absurd, innate understanding of people. He doesn’t it know it, and he doesn’t have the confidence to recognize it, nor the votes of confidence from people around him to be told it, but he has it. 

He looks right at me and shakes his head. “You hate your dad.”

“I never said that,” I respond, leaning against the neighbor locker to his. I keep my eyes on everyone’s shoes as they stroll past. High heels, Converse, Nikes, sandals, boots, and flats, all clacking, stomping, dragging, flapping, shuffling, and strutting against the tile floor. 

“You haven’t seen him since Christmas,” Connie spit, “And you complained about him coming for days before that. You wouldn’t shut up about him. You expect me to believe you wouldn’t have told me about this weeks ago if you were seeing your dad this weekend?”

I shrug. “He surprised me. He just showed up.”

Connie shook his head again, and pinched the bridge of his nose. “Is this about what,” he started, and I cut him off with my glare. I tilted my head, gesturing to the masses of people around us. He continues in nearly a whisper, “Is this about what happened Friday night?”

Of course it is. He knows it is. He just doesn’t want to believe it. Or maybe he’s just that unsure of his own deductive reasoning. 

“No. I told you, I was with my dad.” My voice comes out sharp, curt, and guilt worms into my gut. I don’t know why I can’t tell him the truth. He’s the only person in the world I can tell anything to, but not this? 

“You’re such a shitty liar, Jean,” Connie says. “And you know what? You wouldn’t lie to someone else for anything, but you’ll lie to me?” 

His words feel like a slap, because he’s right. But I don’t know how to tell him that the reason I wouldn’t lie to anyone else is because I don’t care enough of about them. I won’t be able to convince him that I’m lying because I love him. 

God, that even sounds bad to me. 

He walks away in the direction of his class. I watch him go, swerving around people instead of pushing through them like I would. Connie is invisible like that, one of the many nobodies used to being glanced over in our school. 

I can’t keep my eyes off him. 

…

I’m lying in my bed with a book in my hands. I’ve been flipping through the pages for over two hours. I haven’t actually read anything. All I’ve done is stare at the ceiling, listening to the rhythmic collapsing of pages over and over as my thumb clamps them down, then releases them. 

Connie hasn’t texted tonight, or yesterday, or the day before. I’ve picked up my phone a number of times, but haven’t sent any texts. He hasn’t spoken to me at school. I haven’t gone to his locker either, even though I’ve almost made the right turn each morning. 

I wonder if I’ve lost him, and if I have, I don’t know what I’ll do.

Before Connie, I had no one else. I spent my days at school in near silence most of the time, going from class to class and only speaking when I was called on. I had science partners, and someone to practice vocabulary with in Spanish class. In English I peer-edited with others. The only class I was flat-out ignored in was gym. They picked me last because I was chubby. When my team won, the other team always ended up saying something like, “Well, how was I supposed to know he could play?” This would be asked by the captain who was being blamed for not picking me. He’d add, “Look at him, for fuck’s sake.” Then when my team lost, they always asked me why I was so competitive, why I was such a sore loser, why I couldn’t understand that it was just a game.

Why couldn’t they understand that it _wasn’t_ just a game for me? I was the only one that had something to prove. Other chubby people were in the class, but they just took what was given to them. So everyone left them alone, but not me because I couldn’t just take it. And of course, they were pissed at _me_ for not accepting how _they_ treated me. 

Then after my first year of high school was over along with that awful gym class, I joined a weight-lifting class that took up two periods. Every day I was in a weight room for over an hour doing sets, but it didn’t affect me the same way it affected the skinny guys. They became lean and cut. I became the strongest, the biggest, but didn’t lose any fat. Or, not enough, anyway. Every one of them treated me like I was a bear in the weight room they had to tip-toe around, or else be mauled. 

The worst part was, by senior year, I was okay with that. I let people be intimidated by me, because that way they left me alone. I never had to defend myself. I never had to prove myself. I never had to worry about being called a fat ass or being asked if I had lost my dick below my stomach. 

At some point, I even believed that was what it was like to be happy: being left the fuck alone. 

Right about at that point, Connie stumbled into my life. He was always at the school with me, and he was the same age, but I never had classes with him because in middle school he got held back a grade. But you don’t need to be in the same grade to take an elective course together. We both took the same art class. Connie sat beside me without hesitating. That surprised me, but I figured my reputation didn’t reach his ears yet. 

While he sat beside me with his earphones tucked into his ears, hidden slightly by his hood, I was drawing already. 

He peered at the rough drawing of Captain America and his shield. Then he pulled one earphone out.

“That’s really good,” he said. 

“I know.” I wasn’t in the mood to speak with him, nor did I want to give him the impression that I cared what he thought of it. I blushed though, giving myself away. No one but my mom has ever complimented my drawings. No one has really seen them, either. I didn’t realize he was watching me draw, or I probably would have stopped.

“I wish I could draw like that,” he said, “I’d write comics if I could draw.”

Despite myself, I answered, “If you can write them, someone else can draw them.”

He laughed, and I smiled. No one acted this way around me, like I was normal. Most kids avoided sitting next to a chubby person if they could. They acted as if I would breathe their oxygen and suffocate them or something if they did. But here he was, starting a conversation with me. 

“I don’t know if I could write them either,” he said. “Can you?”

I shrugged. 

Another thing about him was that he missed the first hint, that I didn’t want to talk to him, and he missed the second hint, that I didn’t know how to. But by then, I _did_ want to talk to him, and he seemed determined to make it happen whether or not I could participate. 

“Well, you can for sure draw,” he said, “I bet you could write too.” 

Again, he made me smile. I covered it with my mouth because I didn’t want him to see. 

We sat together every day. We had a whole table to ourselves since no one liked me. Connie couldn’t make a Jackson Pollock if he wanted to, so I often helped him. And when I couldn’t think of anything to draw within the guidelines of the assignment, he always thought of something for me that I was willing to put some effort into. 

For weeks I couldn’t figure out why he was so comfortable around me, until one day I saw him outside of class. We weren’t beyond-the-classroom friends at that point yet. We always went our separate ways when the bell rang. But once, by chance, I saw him in the stairwell. He was tapping his foot to whatever he was listening to. His snapback was tilted down, shading his face. And two seniors walked down the stairs and shoved him right down them. 

I knew then, as Connie face-planted and the two seniors stepped by laughing, that Connie was an outsider too. He was a short, scrawny black boy in a predominantly white school. He didn’t fit anyone’s stereotype. He wasn’t tough. He wasn’t aggressive. He wasn’t tall enough to play basketball, and he wasn’t big enough to play football. He was wealthier than most people in the school, because his father was a lawyer and his mom was a doctor, but he wore the types of clothes that could be bought at Target and he had a flip-phone. He liked to read comic books, manga, and if he was going to play any sport it would be soccer. He was nerdy, but not overly smart, so he didn’t fit in with the chess club or debate team types either. He didn’t fit in anywhere, and he didn’t fight back when people pointed it out. 

He wasn’t like me. When people gave him shit, he did what he had to do to get it over with as soon as possible. Make a sarcastic comment at the guys that shoved him while he picked up his scattered worksheets and frayed textbooks. Wipe the cover of the comic book one them purposely stepped on. Then complain as he left the stairwell, and ignore the guys as they called after him. He learned that they would go away sooner if he kept his mouth shut. 

The next day I followed him out of the class, a little nervous that he’d ask me why. He didn’t. He acted as if that was how it always was for us. 

Every once in a while, people would see us walking together and when they did, they veered way out of their way to avoid us. I was self-conscious about it, assuming Connie would take that as a sign he shouldn’t be around me. But he said, “I wish I could be like that.”

“Like what?” I asked.

“You. You know, you look like someone people shouldn’t mess with. I don’t know, confident and like…you know, you couldn’t give a shit about what anyone thought.”

“I look like that?” I _so_ wasn’t like that. Not on the inside. 

He laughs. “Uh, _yeah_. Plus you’re so big. No one fucks with you.”

He said this like it wasn’t a bad thing, and I supposed to him it probably wasn’t. He was probably just being honest with me. Not only that, but he openly admitted a fault of his he wished he didn’t have, something that caused him a lot of trouble, like it was nothing. He trusted me. I don’t know if anyone else has ever trusted me, but Connie did. I remember feeling warm the rest of that day, thinking about what he said. 

I loved many things about Connie, but I loved most that he made it feel natural for us to be friends.

He even made it natural for us to be more than that. 

Someone knocks at my bedroom door. I startle, sitting up in my bed. I shove my book underneath my pillow. I’m supposed to be doing homework. My backpack is still sitting on the floor beside my office chair, unopened. 

“Come in.”

My mom steps in. She’s wearing an apron that weighs her down more each day. Her hair is tied back into a bun, and even though it’s just us in the house and neither of us are worried about it, she’s wearing a hairnet. She’s an excellent cook, and I think that’s why she does it. When she cooks, she must imagine that she’s an actual chef in an actual restaurant.

“Dinner’s ready,” she says. 

“I’ll be out in a minute.”

I don’t think I give anything about what’s on my mind away, but she somehow figures it out. It’s like a mom thing, or maybe I’m more obvious than she thinks. She glances at my backpack, my computer that hasn’t been turned on, my TV in the same state, and finally at me already in my pajamas. 

“Connie couldn’t come over to study tonight?” 

I shake my head, and she measures my response. When she chooses to sit in my office chair instead of leave the room, I know she won’t let this go until it’s settled. 

“What’s going on, Jeanbo?” 

I don’t know how to tell her. As far as she knows, I’m straight. Until a few weeks ago, I knew I was straight. She’s met my girlfriends. They were all short-lived, and often secrets. My longest relationship was with the neighbor girl who I went to daycare with as a child. She stood with me at the bus stop each morning, and was around me enough to realize I wasn’t actually a bear. She made small-talk with me, and we warmed up to each other. When sophomore year ended, she asked me on a date and we were together for the whole summer. Then junior year came, and she was suddenly too cool to be seen with a guy like me. 

“You can tell me.” Her eyes are much more concerned than curious. Her chapped hands are crossed over her lap. A gentle smile rests on her face. 

“Connie and I have been…” I start, then sigh. I’ve never kept anything from my mom. I’m not sure I even know how to or that…I even _want_ to. The fear that I might actually be gay – bi, claws at me from the insides at night. It’s yelling like a fire alarm in my head all day at school. I can’t get it off my mind, and I have never, ever in my life felt so alone. Now Connie isn’t speaking to me, and I feel desolate. “We’ve – okay, the other night when Connie stayed over I, uh…”

I glance at my mom. My heart is in overdrive. 

“I kissed him.” 

I don’t know what I expect from my mom, but I didn’t expect a nod and a sigh like oh-it-happens. 

“And uh, now we’re…we’re not the same,” I say. 

“Well I wouldn’t think so.” She chuckles.

“Seriously, Mom. He’s – he was my friend and now…now I don’t know if he is.”

“Do you like him?” 

My fingers curl and uncurl in my comforter. My bed hasn’t been the same since he stayed here that night either. Every time I look at my bed, it’s not just my bed it’s _the place where it happened_ , it’s the sheets that smelled like him the morning after, it’s the pillow he drooled on and the kicked-off socks I found tucked underneath the sheets at the foot of it. 

I bite my lip. I don’t want to say it out loud. “Mom I…I more than like him.”

Now she’s surprised. Her jaw drops but just as soon it’s being tugged into a grin. “And him? Does he feel the same?”

“I don’t know.” I rub the back of my neck. “That’s not the point. I don’t –”

“It’s not?” 

I’m forced to think about it for a moment, and then I shake my head to clear my thoughts. “No. The point is that I – I don’t know if I can do this. Whatever this is. Be with him, I guess. And he…He’s my best friend. If I mess this up, he won’t be anymore.”

She nods, leaning back in my chair. She glances around my room, at the stacks of books and art supplies cluttering my desk. Her hand brushes over my sketchpad. Thankfully, she doesn’t open it. I’ve been working on a comic for Connie. Ever since he believed I could write them, I’ve been experimenting with it. They all turn into comics about a short black boy with glasses too big for his head and hands too big for his body. 

“Listen,” my mom says, still staring at the cover of my sketchpad, “If he loves you too, it won’t change anything. He won’t stop being your friend no matter where this goes. And Jean, I’m sure he does.”

“I’m not.”

My mom purses her lips. “Do you know what will end your friendship for sure?”

Even though I can feel a punch-line response coming, I sigh and ask, “What?”

“Never speaking to him again.”

Groaning, I fall backward collapsing on my bed. “Okay, okay. I get it.”

“Just talk to him, Jean,” she says, “If he _is_ your friend, then you can talk to him about this.”

“Okay, I will.”

She stands. As she walks toward the door she looks over her shoulder. “Your dinner is getting cold.”

I slide off my bed and follow her into the kitchen.

… 

The next day at school, I’m still not ready to confront him. I want to be able to say everything on my mind. I don’t want to lie to him this time. But if other people are crowding around us, within earshot, I know I’ll back out of it. So, I wait through the longest day of school that’s ever passed for the last bell to ring. I dart out the front doors toward my car and speed home. The whole way there I practice out loud what I want to say, talking to my steering wheel and cars passing by, begging them to hear me out. I try out the words “I love you” several times, and no matter how hard I try to make it sound natural they all jump out of my mouth as if I’ve been sedated.

As soon as I’m home, I leap on to my bed and pull my phone out of my pocket. Before I can think about it and second-guess myself, I dial Connie’s number. 

At first all I can hear is static and some thudding in the background. “Hello?” he says, and it hurts that it sounds a lot more like _what do you want?_

“Hey,” is my meek reply, “I wanted to, uh, talk to you. You know, if you want.”

“Okay,” Connie says, drawing out his syllables. “What?”

“Listen, I’m – I’m sorry about not talking to you and – and lying to you about the, uh, dad thing.”

“Okay.” His voice sounds softer now, like he might actually be listening to me. I cross my fingers over my chest, then grip on to my shirt. I’m practically holding my breath.

“But I…I miss you.” My voice goes really quiet as I say it. “I just want you around again, okay?”

He pauses. “What about what happened. Are you gonna be weird about it?”

I think about what he’s asking. I know what he means, but I don’t know how to respond. “I don’t want it to be weird between us.”

“So you’ll…you know – Are you going to kiss me again?”

This question throws me off guard. I spring into a sitting position on my bed, and look around my bedroom like that answer will be written on the walls. Then I clear my throat. “Well, I mean, I – I haven’t really thought about it… Shit! No! I mean, I have! I have, but…God, I mean, do you want me to kiss you again?”

He chuckles on the other end because of all my stammering. “Yeah. I thought that’s what this was about.”

I grin and cover my face. “I like you, Connie –” I interrupt myself, thinking about what happened in the car. “I actually think I love you.”

“Are you – you’re not fucking with me, are you? I mean you – you actually mean that?” His voice wavers. I’ve never heard him like this. I don’t think I’ve ever heard him cry. Something pinches in my chest, and I ache to reach out to him. I should have just asked him to come over, I could hold him then.

“Yeah. I mean it.”

He lets out a relieved, breathless huff of a laugh. “I love you, too.”

And God, I feel like I’m high floating off my bed. I cover my laugh with my hand so he doesn’t hear it, and shake my head. I feel fucking dizzy about it. It’s only hitting me now how afraid I was of what he’d say.

“That’s…God, Connie, I’m so sorry it took so long to talk to you.”

He laughs on the other end. I hear his mom talking to his dad in the background, and his TV being switched on as he momentarily leaves the room for something. Connie is always walking around in the house when he’s on the phone. I wonder if his parents can hear what’s happening, and I feel like someone’s just chinked the paintjob on my new found exhilaration from hearing he loves me back. 

“So does this mean…”Connie starts, and hesitates before adding, “You know, that we’re dating?”

“Well…yeah, I guess. I can’t really take you out anywhere but like, basically.”

All the other noise on the end is cut and it’s silent. Something slams. It must be Connie’s bedroom door. “Why…can’t you…take me anywhere, exactly? We go places all the time.”

“Well, yeah, I know…But like…I won’t be able to _date_ you.”

“So…you don’t want anyone to know that we’re together.”

The silence stretches on between us. My head sounds like static. My thoughts won’t download. 

“What?” I say, “You mean…you do?”

Connie snorts on the other end. “What the fuck! Of _course_ I want people to know! Why would I want to – to pretend?”

I don’t even know what to say to him. It should be obvious. He even said it himself the first night we kissed, he’s scared. I’m scared. That’s because we have shit to be scared of! 

I run my hands through my hair. My whole body is trembling. I ball my hand into a fist because if I don’t I’ll throw something or snap the nearest object in half over my knee. I feel like I could scream into a microphone and still not feel better. 

“Do you really want to get _more_ shit? You want to be shoved down stairs _more_? You want people to make fun of you _more_? Because that’s what’s gonna happen if we tell people.”

Connie sighs. “You know, Jean, I never really gave a shit about those people once I had you.”

I falter with my response, still ready to argue even though it’s too late for that. So I just sit on the other end, willing myself to come up with words that will convince him. But no words could change his mind, and he must know that he can’t change mine either, because he hangs up. 

I plummet back to earth, crash-landing in reality. I curl up underneath my covers, hoping I’ll drown in them by tomorrow morning. 

… 

But morning does come. I go through the routine of getting ready for school, eating breakfast, and driving to school. Thankfully my mom has already left for work, and won’t be able to smell the guilt and regret on me. 

I walk through the doors, through the students, and come to the ‘T’ at the end of the hall like every other morning. My head turns to look each direction, internally debating. A few students pass, one shoves into me and another cowers, moving way out of her way to avoid me. I’m used to it, and don’t care. 

My feet turn left, and I guess I must be going that direction. 

Each class goes the same way. The first ten minutes burn like hell, as they last for eternity. Then anticipation starts building, like blocks stacking one on top of another inside me. With each block is a new thought. What if he regrets the night before? What if he’s changed his mind? What if he’ll wait at my locker after this class, ready to apologize to me? What if I can ride home with him, and kiss him, and be with him just like I want to be? Maybe, just maybe, all that will happen and I can forget anyone else in the world exists because Connie is enough for me. 

But the bell rings, and I bee-line for my locker. It waits for me alone for all seven of my classes. The last bell has rung. I have no more hope to drain.

I gather all my books, dropping them in my backpack. I slam my locker shut. Even though I know he didn’t wait for me, sometimes he shows up to my locker a little after his classes because he had to talk to a teacher, or had a twenty minute detention or whatever it was. I’ve never minded waiting. I lean against my locker and read, or, try to read a book. I can’t focus on any of the words. All I see are the shapes of speech bubbles and a tiny, wiry superhero in a homemade super-suit climbing the walls of New York City skyscrapers, only a few weeks of parkour practice underneath his belt and already he’s a natural. He’s jumping from ledge to ledge. He takes off his mask, and he has a sweet face underneath there, too sweet for fighting all the bullies he’d fought that day. His hazel eyes gaze back at me. 

A few students shuffle out of a classroom nearby and I startle. I remind myself it’s just a silly comic. Yet, I know if I ever showed him, he’d love it. 

A half hour has passed. He’s still not here, so I decide to stop kidding myself. I head toward the doors, only to weave through the small group of students leaving the classroom. At first I think I’m seeing what I want to see, but no, that’s Connie’s buzzed head. 

My eyebrow furrow, as I watch him hover in the hallway, chatting with a girl I don’t recognize. As far as I know, Connie isn’t in any extracurricular activities. I turn my head, hoping to see what teacher held them back so late, but it’s what I think it is. A sign hangs on the door. 

The GSA meetings are held in this room. 

I stare at those three letters, printed on that sign, hanging from that door like they’re about to be branded on my skin. Yesterday we were both in the closet. Yesterday he was practically mine to hold, mine to kiss, mine to talk to until two in the morning and mine to tell I love you to. 

And overnight, that could never be. 

“Jean?” 

I whip my head around. Connie has walked up to me, and placed his hand on my shoulder. I flinch away from it. He can’t touch me in school anymore. Everyone would know. 

But Connie is beaming. “You just missed it – don’t worry, we meet every week.”

“What? I’m not fucking here for this,” I snap, gesturing to the door. “Why the _fuck_ would I go to the GSA, Connie? Why the fuck would _you_? Don’t you –” But the girl he’s with approaches, and I have to swallow my sob and control my expression. 

“Are you new?” she chirps. Her motions are vibrant, and hard to follow as she practically jumps with excitement, her auburn pony-tail dancing against her back, reciting everything I missed in this meeting. I shake my head at her. 

“He’s not here for that, Sash,” Connie says, turning his head to face her. Her face falls, and she blushes, embarrassed by her over-enthusiasm. I ignore her. 

“What are you doing here?” I ask Connie. 

“Well, I uh…came out, so…I thought I’d join. You know, so I can be around people like me.”

I almost yell– I swear I’m so close to yelling it, I almost don’t care who hears – _but_ I’m _like you!_

“You know…” Sash says, “You don’t have to be gay to join. It _is_ the gay _straight_ alliance…”

Something about her tone makes me think she sees me like a child she has to trick into going to the dentist. Everyone knows that anyone in the GSA, regardless of whether or not they say they’re straight, must be gay. No straight person would risk the social suicide just to show “support”. 

She thinks I’m gay. 

I hate how Connie looks at me, eyes brimming with hope. 

“And I mean, anyone else too, really. Like, it’s not _just_ gay or straight people. I’m trans and Connie’s bi so…” Connie nods, before she continues to ramble. “You know if you were even _questioning_ –”

I sigh, cutting her off, and run my hand through my hair. He’s even given himself a label. I couldn’t even begin to think about those two small letters in that order, let alone claim it as a title. 

I shake my head. “Whatever, Connie, Just – just whatever.” That sob is climbing back up my throat. My vision is going blurry. I don’t think I’ll make it to my car before I cry, but I might be able to make it out the door without them seeing. 

I turn around, trudging down the hall away from him. Connie’s footsteps slam against the tile as he chases after me. I whip around to face him, and the tears are spilling. My face feels so hot they should evaporate.

“You told her?” I choke, “You told random fucking strangers about me? About – about _us_?”

His jaw drops and he shakes his head frantically, “No no no! I didn’t tell her anything! She’s just the, like, president of the GSA so she’s – she’s just always looking for new people, that’s all! She doesn’t know anything!” 

I turn away from him, so he will know I don’t believe him. So I don’t have to see how sincere he looks. So I can wipe my tears and pull myself together. This time he doesn’t fallow as I walk away from him. 

“Jean! I’d never tell anyone that! No matter what!” 

But I’m already one foot out the door. 

… 

My days happen to me. I hardly notice them. My mom asks me what’s wrong, and I lie to her. I tell her nothing has changed. She knows I’m lying, but lets me do it anyway. Right now it’s easier for me to think about graduation, to think about summer break away from everyone at school, and away from the sight of a buzzed head floating through the crowds at school. I think about college, and I tell myself everything will be different. The people there will like me, I’ll be popular, I’ll be confident, I won’t give a shit about anybody, and etc. All that shit. I’ll do it. 

Eventually, I’ll find a girl Mom will approve of and get on with my life. Maybe I’ll finally lose weight and won’t have to deal with everyone staring at me in the gym like I’m a cancerous tumor crowding the room. 

But even as I lie to myself, I know I don’t really want any of that. It’s probably what would be best for me, or at least, what everyone thinks would be, but I don’t care. I don’t want that.

I want my best friend. I want the boy who accepted me and all my fuckeduppedness from the start, without having to warm up to me or be convinced that there’s nothing wrong with me or I’m not actually that bad. I want to kiss him and hold him in front of people, and be proud of that. I want that fucking feeling I have whenever I’m around him, like I’ve never hated myself at all, and I’ve never been made fun of, and who I am has always been enough for me. 

But I know I can’t. 

I lay in my bed at night, weeks after I confronted him, hugging my pillow and crying because it no longer smells like him. 

…

This morning the school halls are nearly empty. I glance at my phone to make sure I’m not late, or somehow especially early. I’m not. It’s seven forty-five, the same time it normally is when I arrive at school. As I walk through the hall, I glance in classrooms to see if people are already sitting down. They’re not. By the time I get to the end of the hallway, I’m just beginning to wonder if it’s a day off I somehow managed to forget, when the chanting interrupts my thoughts.

I run the rest of the way down the hall. At the ‘T’, to the right even further down, a mob of students clots in the hallway. So many kids pack into such a small space that they cram against the lockers. Fists are raised and kids are yelling. Some jump to try to see over other’s heads, and others burrow through the waists and hips of everyone else to get a better look at the eye of the storm. I figured I’d hear the words “Fight, fight, fight!” but I don’t. It’s worse, so much worse. 

_“You fucking faggot!”_

A shudder runs down my spine. That word sinks right into my skin, like a brand being left on me. 

But the queasiness only lasts a moment as all at once it hits me that it’s not just any defenseless kid being beaten up. 

I sprint forward, dropping my backpack on the floor behind me. The crowd doesn’t notice me until I’m shoving them apart to make a path for myself. They curse at me, and stumble to the left or the right as I make way for myself. Someone mutters, “Fucking fat ass,” and I ignore it because my heart is pounding louder than their words and the hallway is so congested I feel like I can’t breathe. Between the last few people ahead of me I see brown limbs getting flung backward and a familiar voice turn into a grunt. 

I bulldoze through the next few people, nearly shoving them on their asses to get up close. 

Connie is crumpled up on the floor against the lockers, shielding his face from a blond kid twice his size. Seriously, Connie can’t weight much more than a hundred pounds and this kid is all muscle. He’s almost as tall as me too. 

And he’s about to kick Connie in the stomach. 

I don’t think. My reaction comes from instinct, like a gut-reaction. The same feeling I get when I miss a step on the stairs, or I don’t brake soon enough while driving, or I’m bench-pressing more weight than I can handle. A flare is lit inside of me and the heat shoots through me right to my fingertips and toes. 

My body does it for me. Just _do something, anything, just fucking move._

My hand catches in the kid’s shirt and I swing him back, all the way around me until he’s slammed up against the lockers directly across from the ones Connie is leaning against. I pick him up like a cat, right under the arms, and let him hang there. He kicks but there’s nothing he can do. I’m at least forty pounds heavier than this kid. I’m taller, wider, and stronger in every way. 

I’m about to tell this kid off, or at least, I thought I was. But, “Are you okay, Connie?” comes out of my mouth instead. 

He shuffles around behind me. I assume he’s standing up. “Yeah, think so,” he chokes.

The crowd has quieted down now, and a number of kids have ran off. The bell is going to ring soon. But enough of them are still around, taking pictures and whispering to one another. A few have officially started to chant “Fight, fight, fight!”

But I’m not going to fight this kid, even though I want to. I’d gladly hurt him. But a teacher, the principle, _somebody_ is going to be here any minute now, just in time for me to get blamed for beating this kid _and_ Connie up. Because that’s just what this kid is hoping for right now. 

I look the kid in the eyes. “Don’t ever fucking touch him again.”

Slamming his back into the lockers knocked the wind out of him. He’s struggling to breathe, so he doesn’t respond. I slam him against it again.

“This is nothing compared to how it will feel when I _actually_ hurt you, understand?” I ask. 

He nods as he chokes. I drop him, and his feet are so weak he slumps right to the floor. 

Then, everyone is staring at me and the first bell rings. I stand there, listening to what everyone is saying and trying not to hear it. Mostly, I succeed, except for someone nearby who says, “I knew that kid was his boyfriend. Knew it.”

Within minutes, it’s as if nothing has happened. Blond kid scrapes himself up off the floor, breathing now. He glances at me, then darts away. Everyone else is opening lockers and grabbing textbooks for first period. Announcements come on over the intercom, and I wonder where the fuck all the teachers were. Sometimes they have meetings before class in the teacher’s lounge, but even still, the fight was loud. It must not have lasted ten years in reality the way it did in my head. In reality, it all probably lasted less than five minutes. 

The only evidence left that a fight happened at all is Connie. He’s standing a few feet away from me, gawking at me while pinching his bloody nose shut. 

“Are you okay?” I ask again. He nods, I don’t believe him.

I have so much I want to say to him. I want to tell him how scared I was, how my heart stopped when I heard the word faggot, how I’ve never been angrier in my life than I am with the kid who hurt him. How much I’ve missed him. How I can’t stop thinking about him. And please forgive me, and please hold me, and kiss me, and come home with me, _please_. My life is black and gray since he’s gone.

But instead I say, “Didn’t I tell you this would happen?”

Connie flinches like my words have cut him. He won’t look me in the eyes. “I just wanted to be brave for once, you know? I wanted to be proud of something. And – and stand up for myself...He called me a faggot and – and I stood up for myself. I shouldn’t have.” 

He talks to me like I didn’t just say the worst sequence of words that could have ever been spoken ever. And his response just _wrecks_ me. My knees go weak and I feel like I’m going to fall over. My body is limp like I’m a rag, and I was just twisted up and wrung out.  


“Yeah,” I say, “I – I know. I know why you did it now.” I really do know why now. Of course that’s why he came out. I’ve given him shit before because he never stands up for himself. He wishes he could be strong, could be brave like he thinks I am. Connie’s parents are on him about everything all the time. He doesn’t do well enough in school. He doesn’t have any achievements. He’s not in any sports. He has nothing he’s good at. In their minds, he’s ordinary in every way and even though Connie has always been special to me, he’s never seen himself that way. When he came out, I took it personally, as if it has anything at all to do with me.

I rub the back of my neck and look away from him, so he won’t see how bad my lip is quivering. Connie is crying and I feel like I’m almost there too. 

“Well…thanks for saving me,” Connie says.

I’m about to respond, but the second bell rings and Connie has already disappeared around the corner.

I don’t go to class. I grab my backpack where it’s been kicked underneath the lockers in the hall, and I skip school. 

…

I can’t believe how many kids are in there. At least a dozen have gone in, and the meeting doesn’t start for another five minutes. They walk past me into the classroom without paying attention to me. They can’t tell I’m on the verge of having a panic attack. I feel like all the parts of me that are supposed to be in my rib cage have fallen into my feet. 

But it’s been two weeks since I saved Connie from being beaten. Two more weeks without talking to him, two more weeks of thinking way too much and not sleeping enough. I keep telling myself that I got through school just fine before I met Connie, and I did. I still would. But now that I know what it’s like to have him in my life, I’d never choose to live without him. I don’t want to even think about living the rest of my life as if Connie Springer never stumbled into it. 

Besides, since I saved Connie, the rumors have swarmed. Everyone already thinks they know about me. I get as much shit as I used to, it just comes in a different form. It’s always behind my back, of course. No one would risk getting pinned to a locker. 

And somehow that makes me feel brave enough to do this. I’m as tall, and big, and strong as I was when everyone thought I was straight. That won’t change now. 

So, one minute before the GSA meeting is supposed to start, I step into the classroom. 

I’m not breathing for the first five seconds. Everyone – some sitting in desks, some sitting on them, and others sitting on the floor – stare at me. I’m waiting for them to make fun of me when I remember abruptly and foolishly that they won’t do that to me. They’re like me. 

They smile at me. A couple wave. I can’t believe I thought this would be a big deal. 

I exhale, and search for Connie. He’s one of the few sitting on the floor in the very back of the classroom against the wall, so at first I don’t see him. But when I do, I say his name and he looks up. A grin the size of his head spreads across his face. He pats the floor space next to him and I stride through the desks to sit on the floor beside him.

Sasha, who has been standing nearly on her toes in excitement at the front of the room, is wearing a pink dress and lipstick that matches. Her hair is still pulled back, but it’s curled today. She grins as she starts to speak. 

“Okay, so I was going to wait for Hange to get here, but they’re in talking with the principle so I’ll just start now,” she says. Hange is a teacher; that much I know, although I’ve never had their class myself. I’ve never heard a “Mr.” or a “Ms.” attached to the name before, and at least every student ever has tried to figure out if they’re a man or a woman. I always wondered why they didn’t just tell their students right away, and I’m only now realizing that it might not be a coincidence no one knows. Especially if they’re the teacher organizing the GSA. 

Sasha continues, “We’re going to be talking about the day of silence today, which is coming up next Friday. But before all that, we have someone new!” She looks at me. “You should introduce yourself!”

I blush, because everyone is staring at me and I know how they all think of me. Or at least, I know collectively what the school has thought of me. Big, tough, intimidating, unapproachable kid that no one wants to be friends with. Now I’m in the GSA and they’re all wondering if they’re in a parallel universe. They also all know my name, and know what happened with Connie, but we’re pretending we don’t, apparently.

“I’m Jean,” I say, “I’m, uh, bi, I guess.”

Someone says, “Cool” under his breath, and another nods as if she can totally understand the “I guess” part of my sentence. They’re so relaxed about my confession, and even about my presence, that I can feel comfortable around them the way I never did in my weight-lifting class or art class. I wonder if – and hope that – Connie is friends with any of them besides Sash, and won’t mind me sticking around too. 

Sasha welcomes me, then says, “Okay! So.” They return their attention to Sasha as she jumps into another breathless, rambling speech covering everything she can regarding the day of silence and how none of us are actually going to be silent on the day of silence. I completely zone out for the rest. 

Because Connie is smiling, and on the floor between us, where no one can see and no one is looking, he’s holding my hand. 

… 

When the meeting ends, Connie lets go of my hand. We stand up, and my stomach is fluttering as he follows me out of the classroom. We’re both smile. A few people nearby snicker, but I can tell they’re just teasing. It feels amazing, for once, knowing that somewhere nearby people are talking about us because they’re happy for me and Connie. I don’t think that’s ever happened to either of us before, knowing the people surrounding us aren’t against us. 

We go to his locker without saying anything. I keep peeking at him. Last time I was face-to-face with him he was crying. Now a rose blush has blossomed under his dark skin and his eyes are wide, hazel, and beaming like the sun. 

He leans against his locker and reaches for my hand. I take it. The hairs on the back of my neck raise, knowing someone – outside of the other GSA members, obviously – could see us. But what are they going to do about it? No one can touch us now. 

“What made you change your mind?” Connie asks. 

“I wanted to be with you more than I didn’t want to come out,” I say, “You just won out.”

He stands on his toes, and I wrap my arms around him, lifting him right off the ground for a second as we kiss. 

His fingers lace with mine as we walk out of the school.

…

We step inside my front door. I call for my mom to see if she’s home from work. The house is empty. I pull Connie through the front room, down the hall, to my bedroom. We stumble, and walk into the wall once, because he’s so much shorter than me. He’s either on his toes or I’m hunching my back every time. But it’s not like I’m going to stop kissing him. 

We make it to my bed, and I don’t know where this is going or what we’re doing but the blood is rushing through my veins a hundred miles an hour. 

Connie falls back onto my bed. His head hits something, apparently, because his lips part from mine and he tilts his head. His arm reaches behind him, and his fingers hook in the spiral wire of my sketchbook. 

He pulls it out from under his head. The cover was flipped around so that it was lying open with the drawing exposed. 

Connie doesn’t mean to glance at it. At first he’s only acknowledging what it is, and then he does a double-take and squints at the drawing. I blush. I forgot I was drawing this morning before school. My nerves started twisting around like a tornado in my gut last night, knowing what I was going to do today, and drawing is the only thing that can ever calm me down. 

“Is that – is that _me_? I mean I’m – I’m not just seeing things, am I?” he asks, as his fingers brush over the hashed marks from my pen, creating the necessary shading to darken the unmasked hero’s skin. I haven’t given him a name yet. All I see is Connie, so it’s not easy to come up with a name that fits. I’m not all that creative with coming up with superhero names either. 

“Uh.” I clear my throat. I ease myself off him, sitting on the bed beside him. He sits up so that he can look at the drawing under the light streaming in from my window. “Yeah, sorta…I mean, he’s, you know…inspired by you.” The superhero is totally him. 

Connie flips through the dozen or so comic pages before this unfinished drawing. His fingers outline the letters of “Pow!” and “ _screeeeeeech_!” and any number of other old-fashioned, cheesy sound effects I slapped on there. 

Connie reaches the first page. The unmasked hero is kissing someone in an alleyway, barely illuminated by a nearby streetlight. The man he’s kissing isn’t me. He’s someone I made up, and it’s obvious. His silhouette is dull, his hair black and plain. His eyes are the default football shape. I hate him and I wish I wouldn’t have bothered with him at all, but I drew that piece the day after Connie kissed me. I couldn’t stand to put myself in there. No one wants to see someone like me on the page. 

Connie furrows his eyebrows as he points at the nobody kissing the unmasked hero. “Why didn’t you make _you_ the superhero?” 

I look away from him, and occupy myself with the tears in my jeans. One of them tears more each time I wash it. It doesn’t help that I’m tearing out the threads right now either. My mom will probably throw them away before too long. 

“Because, you know,” I say, trying to sound like I don’t care. I shrug and it’s forced. “Heroes don’t look like me.”

“Dude…” Connie breathes. He sets my sketchbook aside, laying it down on the bed as if he’s afraid it’ll combust. He turns to face me again, and places his hands on either side of my face so I can’t look away from him. “That’s – okay, in movies? No, superheroes don’t look like you but that’s – that’s because people who make movies are _fucked up_. You know they wouldn’t make me a superhero, either, right? When’s the last time you saw a black superhero kissing another dude?” 

I bite my lip, trying to think of a response that will somehow shut down what he just said. I don’t want him to know how easily he made me feel better, for some reason. 

“But in real life?” he keeps going. His voice is softer now. His fingers run through my hair. “They do look like you. They _are_ you. I didn’t see any random, skinny guy pinning the kid who punched me against a locker. You did that. Because, I keep telling you, man: _You’re_ the strong, brave one, not me.”

“But you came out,” I tell him, arguing with him because it’s so hard for me to let myself believe he’s right, “I wasn’t scared of the kid that hit you. But you were scared to come out and you did it, anyway.”

He snorts at that. “Would you stop acting like you’re not the shit? What’s wrong with you? _Brag_ a little, Jean. You're supposed to be full of yourself, remember?”

I laugh, because he's right, it's what everyone says about me - or used to say about me, before I beat up that guy for Connie. I wrap my arms around his waist so that we can kiss and keep on kissing, because that’s all I want to do. Really, seriously, I can’t think of anything else in the world that I’d rather do, than kiss Connie. And how many people in the world right now can say they wouldn’t rather be doing anything else if they could? Not many, and I’m one of the few. 

When his lips part from mine, he reaches for the sketchbook. His fingers trace over the nobody in the first drawing that the unmasked hero is kissing. 

“This is awesome,” Connie says, “I knew you’d be good at it.”

“Me too,” I say, feigning arrogance and nodding at him like God told me himself I was the king of drawing comics. I almost believe myself. Connie laughs.

“ _That’s_ it,” he says, kissing me again. “But you have to change it.”

“I can’t redraw the picture.” 

Connie shrugs. “I don’t mean change the drawing. I mean, you could change the story to include…Oh, I don’t know. Another guy, whose really grumpy, and maybe he has some anger problems and probably can’t talk to strangers very well and makes fun of this superhero’s glasses sometimes. And maybe he’s also, like, a really, really, really great kisser or something but I don’t know.” Throughout his whole rant he’s shrugging his shoulders, and shaking his head, and pretending he’s just coming up with all these traits now, all while I fight to cover his mouth with one hand. He’s so tiny and wiry he worms out of the way each time, laughing more as he talks. 

Finally, I pin him to my bed with one hand. I toss the sketchbook on the floor, only sparing it a glance to make sure it didn’t land in a way that would bend or tear the drawings. 

“Okay,” I say, “I will.”

“And he has to be a superhero too,” Connie adds. 

I kiss him one more time, softly and deeply, sighing into it, before I answer him. “He will be.”

**Author's Note:**

> If you're curious, my personal tumblr URL is in-agony-and-ecstasy@tumblr.com and my writing-only tumblr URL is the-only-one-in-color@tumblr.com.


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